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City, business owners join to help end homelessness

By AARON SHAROCKMAN
Published November 9, 2006

ST. PETERSBURG - Committed to the aggressive goal of ending homelessness in 10 years, civic and elected leaders are taking the message to the local business community.

Leaders of the St. Petersburg Area Chamber of Commerce and city downtown partnership will meet with business owners this morning to detail Pinellas County's plan to eradicate homelessness, laying the groundwork in a broad-based campaign that calls for least $6-million in private support.

Community support to a proposed countywide solution is crucial, said Don Shea, the president of the St. Pete Downtown Partnership.

On any given night in Pinellas, an average of 4,450 people go to sleep homeless - including 98 families with children. Officials have developed a series of steps, based on providing housing and job training, that they believe can eliminate the area's growing problem.

"We're not asking people for funding commitments - yet," said Shea, who expects about 20 businesses to attend the meeting at the chamber's downtown St. Petersburg headquarters. "However, to address the problem, funds will have to be identified."

The meeting, and much of the county plan, is based off the successes of Miami in the 1990s. There, community leaders and government together have dropped the homeless population from about 8,000 to 1,700. The business community, in particular, built a trust for homelessness services that now totals about $35-million.

"The business community in Miami led the charge and turned the whole thing around," said St. Petersburg City Council member Jamie Bennett, a leading advocate for homeless issues. "We can do it here too. But you have to have the business community."

[Last modified November 9, 2006, 01:58:54]